Research Methods

• Qualitative data refers to information from a research study that is non-numerical, and usually in the form of words. For example, a written account of the responses of a participant during an interview.
• A suitable question for qualitative data would be: 'Please 𝙚𝙭𝙥𝙡𝙖𝙞𝙣 in your own words how you felt when the Experimenter told you that you had no choice but to continue giving the shocks.'
• Quantitative data is information from a research study that is in the form of numbers. For example, the time it takes for a participant to react to a stimulus.
• A suitable question for quantitative data would be: 'Please tell me on a scale of 𝙤𝙣𝙚 𝙩𝙤 𝙩𝙚𝙣, how much anxiety you felt when the Experimenter told you that you had no choice but to continue giving the shocks.'
• Explain validity including the ways to assess/check it and the types of validity

  Validity means whether something is measuring what it is supposed to measure, valid means true and thus a research method is valid if it is measuring what it set out to measure

  
  

  There are two ways to assess the validity of an experiment/research:

  Face validity - this is the simplest technique and is where an independent researcher separate to the experiment looks at the measure being used and assesses whether or not it will actually measure correctly. The researcher will see if there are any extraneous variables that could affect the research and then makes a conclusion

  
  

  Concurrent validity - this is where the research is compared with a similar procedure that has been done in the past where validity has already been established. If the scores correlate as a strong positive then the new test is likely to be valid

  
  

  There are two main branches of validity which are internal and external

  Internal looks at extraneous variables within the study and how easily a cause and effect relationship can be drawn whereas external looks at the extent to which we can generalise the results outside the setting.

  Within external validity there is ecological, population and temporal validity.
• Explain reliability including the ways to assess/check it and how to improve reliability

  Reliability is achieved when the results gained are consistent, reliability just means consistency

  
  

  There are three ways to assess the reliability of an experiment/research:

  Test-Retest method - this is where the same test is given to participants on separate occasions and then compared and if the two sets of scores are consistent it is said to be reliable. Important to keep large time gap between to reduce order effects

  
  

  Inter observer method - used to assess reliability in an observation, the extent to which researchers agree on the behaviours being observed independently. If they have a consistent number of tallies agreed then it is said to be reliable

  
  

  Split half method - this is used to see whether the items in a test/questionnaire are consistent with other items in the test. Items on one test are split into two and then the scores on each half are compared, if a high positive correlation is seen then the test is reliable

  
  

  There are five ways to improve reliability which are:

  1) Use standardised procedures

  2) Written instructions

  3) Pilot studies

  4) Standardised method for collecting data

  5) Training for observers